Karl Rove's Effort to Keep GOP In Leftward Lurch

Former presidential advisor Karl Rove established the Conservative Victory Project this month as a means of becoming the gatekeeper to Republican nominations in the intra-party battle between constitutionalists and neo-conservatives.

Former presidential advisor Karl Rove established the "Conservative Victory Project" this month as a means of becoming the gatekeeper to Republican nominations in the intra-party battle between constitutionalists and neo-conservatives. Specifically, Rove would target elimination of Tea Party and other small government constitutionalists in GOP primaries because of alleged fears that the constitutionalists lose general elections.

“There is a broad concern about having blown a significant number of races because the wrong candidates were selected,” Steven J. Law, the president of American Crossroads, told the New York Times for February 2. “We don’t view ourselves as being in the incumbent protection business, but we want to pick the most conservative candidate who can win.” Specifically, the establishment, anti-Tea Party wing of the GOP points to the defeat of Tea Party favorites Richard Mourdock and Todd Akin in the November election in their U.S. Senate races in Ohio and Missouri. Akin and Mourdock had made unpopular statements against abortion in the case of rape during the campaign, statements that were credited by the liberal press for their general election failures.

Of course, Rovian establishment candidates won most GOP nominations in major races in 2012 before being thrashed in the November general election. Rove claimed to be neutral in the Republican presidential primary in 2012, but he attacked all the non-Romney candidates as unelectable. As Slate, the on-line magazine, put it in 2011: “Karl Rove has already begun his independent, well-funded campaign to return a Republican to the White House. Any Republican will do, honestly, but he would strongly prefer a somewhat competent and 'electable' one, thank you very much. So he’s attacking all the non-Mitt Romney candidates.” In the end, Rove's favorite, Mitt Romney, proved all too unelectable.

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